Detente
by TimeTheFinalFrontier
Summary: Russia and America take a moment to think of the possibility of finding love within each other during the Cold War.
1. Chapter 1

Détente

Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction. No copyright infringement or treason is or ever will be meant by myself or by any entity otherwise associated with the production of this work of fanfiction.

Alfred let himself into Ivan's estate without knocking, one gun clasped tightly in both hands, another holstered on his belt, and a third poorly concealed under his bomber jacket. Ivan sat at his desk in the center of the wide room, assembling a riffle. "America," he greeted fondly, icy smile spreading across his face.

"Ivan," Alfred said tersely, raising his gun.

Ivan's smile grew brighter. "Did I say you could call me that? I didn't mean it, if I did," he said cheerily, contemplating his newly assembled riffle. "Hmm, I don't remember if this was loaded. Let's find out, da?" With that, Ivan flicked off the safety and stood, bracing the riffle between his knees and bending over a bit as he pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. "I guess not," Ivan said, pleased.

"Commie bastard," Alfred muttered.

Ivan looked up, purple eyes glowing. "What was that?" He frowned, pouting slightly as he lifted the riffle, spinning it as he slowly approached Alfred.

"I said," Alfred growled, raising his chin, "Commie. Bastard."

"Is that so, da? I wonder how your capitalist system would withstand a Russian bullet?" He asked in an amused voice, shouldering his riffle and leveling the barrel with Alfred's head. "I was thinking... That perhaps little Matvey would agree to become one with Mother Russia?" He laughed.

"Come within ten feet of my brother and I'll blow your commie ass to hell and back," Alfred growled, staring nervously down the barrel of the other's raised riffle.

"Hmm," Ivan mused, giggling as he pulled the trigger. He smiled at Alfred's sharp intake of breath and the way the other trembled slightly as he lowered the weapon. "I thought you knew it wasn't loaded?" Russia asked, shrugging as he walked back around the curve of his desk and lowered himself into the burgundy leather seat. "Vodka?" He offered, raising a bottle.

"Stupid Russian vodka," Alfred protested half-heartedly.

"More for Mother Russia," Ivan countered, hiding a smile at Alfred's vague attempts to keep up his charade. "You know what I think?" Ivan asked, taking a deep gulp of marshmallow vodka.

"Didn't know Brezhnev allows thinking," Alfred said, taking the bottle once the other had finished and taking a few sips of his own, grimacing.

"I think that we don't really hate each other."

Alfred rolled his eyes before turning away. "Even such a stupid commie bastard like you couldn't possibly believe that. General Winter getting to you, huh? The cold finally gone to your head? How in the world did you make it to 1969 without having heard of the Cold War?"

"I think that we don't really hate each other," Ivan repeated.

"I heard you the first time, commie. Awesome heroic hearing, you know?"

"If you really hated me, you wouldn't break in here everyday and stay for two, three hours. If you hated me, you wouldn't go through all this trouble to insult me and my political system. No, Alfred, you don't hate me. America might hate Russia, but _you_ don't hate _me._"

Alfred slammed the vodka bottle into the table, sending shards flying across the room. A look of rage contorted his features and he kept squeezing the fragments in his hands until blood ran down his wrists and onto the floor. "I hate you," Alfred growled. "I hate you and everything you stand for and everything you represent. I hate your stupid Russian accent and your stupid Russian winters and your stupidly large country and your stupid Russian economy and your stupid Russian leaders and your stupid Russian part in the Wars. And if I could, if I could nuke you off the face of the planet without killing myself and the others, I would, and, hey, to hell with the others, if I had a red button right here on this table that would destroy you and your country and your people, I would press it and press it and press it and keep pressing it until I erased your stupid Russian communist system from time itself!" Alfred screamed, clawing the glass shards that had embedded themselves in his palm and throwing them weakly at Ivan, who looked up at him with a mix of childish awe and unmasked adoration.

"I'm not afraid of you, America," Ivan said softly.

"Well, you should be," Alfred shouted, raising the gun at Ivan and shooting six times, sneering in frustration when no shots rang out and throwing the weapon away as he drew the gun from the holster on his belt. Raising this weapon and shooting repeatedly with the same effect, Alfred screamed, tears beginning to run down his face. Desperately, he ripped open his coat and took his previously poorly concealed gun in hand and started shooting wildly, blindly, eyes clouded with tears.

"If you really hated me, Alfred, you wouldn't be standing in front of me, telling me how much you hate me and shooting at me with unloaded guns and crying. I am not afraid of you, America."

"Oh, well, then, tell me, what are you afraid of, you stupid, cold-hearted, evil, sinful, scornful commie bastard?"

"I'm..." Ivan paused. Alfred looked at him, teary-eyed, and Ivan was reminded of how much alike they were, two children who had never been given the chance to grow up thrust into power beyond their control, fighting each other with unloaded guns and hollow words. "I'm scared of myself, mostly," he finished, finally finding the courage to say the words.

Alfred looked shocked for a moment, trying and failing to regain his composure. "Oh."

"And... I thought you were different. From the others. I thought that you could... That you could be my friend. You're... You're the only one who doesn't run from me, and I thought that maybe... But I was wrong. Because you hate me."

"Ivan..."

Ivan pulled on his mask again and gave Alfred a blank smile. "Did I say you could call me that? Because if I did, I didn't mean it."

Alfred rubbed a bloody hand over his face and finally managed a cracked smile and Ivan thought he looked beautiful in burgundy. Alfred's mouth opened and closed a few times before he finally settled on, "One day," before gathering his guns and walking away stiffly and slowly, with a trace of reluctance in his steps. The sound of the lock being turned from the outside filled the room and Ivan smiled sadly as he watched Alfred's shadow shrinking away against the sunflower-yellow curtains.

{And somewhere under the table, his heart thumped onto the floor again. He heard it hopping towards the door, in the direction that Alfred had gone. Scooping it up again and putting it back in his chest, he smiled and said, "One day."}

Historical Notes:

This is supposed to take place in early 1969 before the moon landing.

Leonid Brezhnev was in office as the leader of the Soviet Union from October 14th, 1964 to November 10th 1982.

Détente: The easing of tensions between two political entities, generally in reference to the period of negotiations between the Soviet Union and the United States with similar goals that began in 1971, about two years after this story takes place.


	2. Mr Gorbachev

November 9, 1989:

Alfred walked through the open door, knocking on his way in.

"Why, America. What a pleasure. Please, come in," Ivan said from somewhere in the shadows, watching America make his way across the room.

"Mr. Gorbachev," Alfred began, making his way to Ivan's desk and lowering himself into the worn leather chair. "Tear... What was it now? It's been months, after all. Oh yes. Tear. Down. This. Wall."

Ivan tried to sink further into the shadows, wiping tears from his eyes tiredly. He'd not slept since that day in June, and he was so tired. He just wanted to go to sleep, he thought blearily.

"How does it feel?" Alfred asked, propping his feet up on the desk and rummaging through Ivan's drawers. "Vodka, vodka, vodka," he said mechanically. "Don't you ever drink anything else? Or, I don't know, do anything but drink at your working desk? I see one pen, vodka, a small stack of paper, more vodka, oh, a folder, that's nice, and vodka. That's all. Oh, wait. What is this? More vodka. Yup, vodka, vodka, vodka. Don't you have anything decent to drink?"

Ivan whimpered quietly. He tore his eyes away from Alfred, allowing them to flutter closed.

"Germany is happy," Alfred continued as if he hadn't heard Ivan's small noise of distress. "Him and Prussia. West and East. Oddly enough, Germany's happier than Prussia, which you really wouldn't expect, with Prussia being behind the wall and all. Well, I mean, there is a good reason. That reason being that Prussia's very barely alive. So, I guess when you're more dead than alive, you're too dead to be happy." Alfred laughed bitterly. "My God Ivan, what did you do to him! And the people, my God, the people! How many have you killed?"

"I-I've not killed anyone," Ivan whispered. He felt his hands grow wetter with the words and a metallic smell assaulted his senses a few moments later.

"No? So, all those people that died trying to cross the wall, all of your own citizens that have disappeared over the last decades, that wasn't you? Well then who was it? Because it certainly wasn't me!"

"Wasn't it? You c-could have h-helped..." Ivan hazarded a glance in Alfred's direction and whimpered at the devastation written across his features.

"Yeah, I suppose I could have. But... Would you have wanted it?"

"No."

"Well, there you are," Alfred said bitterly.

"You still could have done _something._"

"Ivan... Come out of the shadows."

"N-Nyet."

"Come here or I'm going to turn on the light. I'm sure that would hurt, after all these months in the darkness. So, your choice."

Ivan whimpered and remained still and silent in his little corner away from the world.

"Lights it is, then," Alfred muttered. Ivan watched him fumbling around in the partial darkness, noting that the other's eyes hadn't grown used to the lightlessness yet.

The lights went on with a spark and a low buzz. Ivan's eyes snapped closed and Alfred turned around, laughing triumphantly. "The hero-" He began, but fell silent as he turned and saw Ivan for the first time in months.

Ivan's clothes were ripped, clinging to his body in bloody strips. His eyes were sunken into his face and the smile had fallen from his face. His hair was matted with dried blood and ash, and his hands were wet and shiny with new blood.

Alfred's hand flew up to cover his mouth. "I-I-I," he started to say, falling silent for a long moment before settling on, "Commie bastard," and fleeing the room.

Ivan started to shake in his absence, staying like that for hours, days, until the lights flickered and died, power exhausted. Night came and went and sleep still evaded the nation. Snow fell and drifted in through the open door and nightmares visited the still sleepless Ivan, silent and swift like a bullet through his brain.

And somewhere, someplace, a wall started to fall.

Historical Notes:

Reagan said, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall," in a speech at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin on June 12, 1987.

East Germany opened the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989. Demolition of the wall began that evening and continued for months.


	3. Glasnost

March 11, 1990:

"I can see right through you," Alfred whispered, walking through the front door without knocking and sitting on the arm of Ivan's chair.

"Go away," Ivan whispered, voice thick with tears.

"No, man, I really can. You're like some sort of ghost. Nice trick. Guess pretending to be afraid of ghosts all these years finally paid off."

"I can't do this alone."

"Do what?"

"This... This war."

"Ivan, man, you're scaring me. You're never like this. Not since the Wall fell. You're not alone with the entire Red Army on your side."

"It's not been called the Red Army since 1946, Amerika. And... That's not what I meant. I can't do this without the others."

"Aw, are the little Soviet States giving the big old communist dictatorship trouble?"

"Didn't you hear?"

"Hey, it's still yesterday in some places!"

"Here," Ivan said stiffly, shoving a newspaper in Alfred's hands, rising, and walking away into the vast expanse of the rest of the estate house.

Alfred watched him go, frowning, before sliding into the cozy chair and reading the headline on the front page. He made a noise of surprise and reread it, over and over again until the words began to make sense.

Folding the paper carefully and placing it beside him on the room chair, he stood after a moment, looking around. "Ivan?" He called, spinning around and peering into the shadows gathering at the corners of the room. "Ivan!" Silence greeted him as the echoes of his enemy's name died.

Alfred rested his head in one hand for a moment, replaying the headline in his mind. In that moment, he could see the future unraveling in front of him, nations falling like dominoes in reverse, rising from the place they'd been toppled. Flashes of a world untainted by shades of red and ill defined by an absence of fear raced through his mind, and he shivered in a burst of pure terror.

Alfred shook himself free from the vision and let himself out, locking the door behind him for what seemed like the first time, and walking away, accelerating into a sprint by the time he reached the sidewalk.

Back in Ivan's too-empty estate, the newspaper that so innocently bespoke of the things that would change the world proudly declared the beginning of the end of an era.

_Lithuania Declares Independence from U.S.S.R. _

Historical Notes:

On March 11, 1990, Lithuania declared independence from the Soviet Union.


	4. Perestroika

December 23, 1991:

Ivan looked up at the sound of jingle bells. Alfred stood in the doorway, snowflakes melting from his hair and eyelashes in the almost oppressive heat of the room. Alfred smirked, shaking himself off and closing the door in his wake. He pressed himself against the oak door, turning around and tossing the key to Ivan.

"I won't be needing that anymore," he said cordially.

A flicker of something dark passed over Ivan's face, but it was gone as quickly as it had come. "Why are you here," he asked, fingering the key almost reverently.

"It's tomorrow in some places," Alfred replied. "That's why. Although... I have to say, I'm surprised that after all these years, you still haven't changed the lock." He laughed dryly. "Very unheroic," he added as an afterthought.

Ivan looked up, a real smile hiding behind his blank one. "What's tomorrow?"

"I don't know. Why don't you tell me?" Alfred asked, smiling as he made his way around the room.

"How would I know? Tomorrow is tomorrow."

"You're the last one left, you know."

Ivan's smile turned bitter. "Whatever do you mean, Amerika?"

Alfred cringed. "You know I hate it when you call me that. Alfred's fine, really. I've been saying that since 1917."

"Has it been that long?"

"We were allies," Alfred sighed. "We've changed."

"And whose fault was that?" Ivan asked in a childish voice, the curiosity in his tone bordering on genuine.

"It's over, Ivan."

"Did I say you could call me-"

"No," Alfred screamed. "Don't go there. It's over. You never told me I could call you that. I know! But you never objected... Before." Alfred turned away, blushing.

Ivan laughed at the other's distress. "It's not over, Amerika. This is war."

"Yeah? You and what army? You said yourself when this started to end, that you couldn't do it yourself. And now? You're all alone. There's no one else left."

Ivan smiled. "What do you mean? There's me and little Latvia and Lithuania and Estonia and there's my sisters, Belarus and Ukraine, and, and-"

Alfred cut him off with a finger to his lips. "Not anymore. They're all gone. It's only you now."

"Didn't anyone ever tell you not to lie?" Ivan spoke through Alfred's finger, which the western nation dropped after a moment.

Alfred shook his head sadly and resumed his journey around the room, always facing away from the Russian.

Ivan blinked. "Aren't you going to call me a commie bastard?" He asked weakly.

"No."

Ivan frowned, lower lip trembling. "Is that all?"

"Yeah. For now, I mean. I'll be back tomorrow."

"I thought it was already tomorrow in some places?"

"Yeah. Well. But not here. You'll... You'll let me in, right?"

"Of course not. Why would I let the enemy in?"

"Because, by this time tomorrow, I'll not be your enemy anymore and you'll be able to open the door. It... It scares me to death. I know that's so not heroic, but... This war, has been everything to me. And now that it's over... Now that it's over, I'm not sure what will become of me."

"Silly Amerika. It's not over."

"Didn't anyone tell you not to lie?" Alfred mocked.

Ivan was silent. He felt his heart beating more wildly and he pressed a hand over his chest to stop it from falling out.

Alfred completed his tenth circuit around the room and stopped at the door. He put one hand on the doorknob and the other flat against the polished surface. "Merry Christmas, Ivan," he said softly, letting himself out quietly. There was no click of the lock and no silhouette making its way down the stairs and onto the street, only the snow and the wind and the silence making itself known through the heat that clung to him in the dimly lit room.

Historical Notes:

Perestroika was the Russian term for the policy reforms and restructuring that took place during the latter days of the Cold War.

Russia declared its independence from the Soviet Union on December 24, 1991, 8 days after Kazakhstan did so, making Russia the last country to do so.


End file.
